Hat tip Creeping Sharia
Once again, CAIR employs its bullying tactics to go after private citizens. This is what happened to a group of private citizens who exercised their right of free speech to petition against the construction of a mosque.
http://creepingsharia.wordpress.com/2014/04/26/michigan-cair-terrorizes-private-citizens-who-opposed-mosque-construction/
It is one thing when an organization like CAIR goes to court to contest governments or other organizations. It is quite another when they use their power and resources to target individual citizens for exercising their right of free speech just because it is against their agenda.
This kind of bullying is a legitimate concern, whether it is Republicans targeting anyone who signed a petition to recall Scott Walker, gay organizations targeting anyone who signed a petition to put Prop 8 on the ballot, or CAIR targeting individuals who signed letters or petitions opposing a construction project.
ReplyDeleteCAIR, obviously, is trying to show that the township made its decision based on prejudice against Islam, rather than out of legitimate concerns for traffic, congestion, and impact on a residential neighborhood. It is entirely possible that prejudice was a motive. It is also entirely plausible that this was the wrong place for any structure that would attract crowds, require extensive parking, and generation traffic congestion.
The reason such litigation is nasty is that it is hard to establish MOTIV, and therefore to establish pretext. Thus, anyone with an arguable claim will go to the limit to find evidence.
CAIR may have a plausible claim under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. I know of a congregational church (not part of UCC, part of a more traditional congregational movement) that used the act to counter a local zoning board that simply didn't want a tax-exempt church acquiring ownership of the land. A mosque has just as much claim.
But, I believe there is a legitimate concern with mosques being built based on how much money a Saudi foundation will cough up, rather than on the space requirements for the local practicing Muslim population, with allowance for reasonable growth over time.